The invention relates to digital information playback. More particularly, the invention relates to secure streaming of digital information between a source and a playback device.
Sources currently exist that provide digital audio and/or video content to remote playback devices. The digital content can be provided by a network, such as the Internet, or other network. The digital content can be provided as a file that is downloaded and played, or as a stream of data that can be played as received. For digital content that is subject to a controlled distribution, a security scheme is required.
One scheme for content protection is to protect access to the content. Access protection can be applied to both files and streams of content. For example, a user name and password may be required to access the content. However, access protection can be defeated, for example, by disclosure of a user name and/or password, or by otherwise determining an authorized user name and password. Once an authorized user name and password are obtained, an unauthorized party can have access to the content.
Because access protection can be defeated as described above, additional and/or different content protection schemes are often necessary to provide satisfactory content protection. Therefore, what is needed is a protection scheme that provided better content protection than simple content access protection.
A method and apparatus for secure steaming of digital audio and/or visual content is described. Authorization data corresponding the digital content is received. A check is performed to determine whether a playback device is authorized to play the digital content based, at least in part, on the authorization data. A stream of data representing portions of the digital content is played, if authorized. In one embodiment, portions of the stream of digital content are intermittently checked for authorization.